News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


You have a codex based legal system which probably means that people can't be prosecuted for the Alice thing. In Common Law systems there's the concept of "reasonable understanding" which means they can. I'd just ban it.


Both are important. There should never be a state narrative about history as there is in Poland. It should look at the good and the bad and above all understand the way people thought. It sounds like Hocke wants school to teach the 'Great Man' approach to history. I'd be happy about that (after all it was invented by my most famous relative who admired and famously wrote about Frederick of Prussia) if it wasn't inherently fascistic and if it didn't ignore the social context and the incredibly complex sets of circumstances that drive things along and if it didn't invariably extol the virtues of individuals, hero-worshipping or demonising them.


Fascists pretend to be anti or pro all sorts of things. It's solely about what suits their cause: power and destruction.

History / Poland and Britain started WW2 [356]

r*SSian propaganda even.

Off-Topic / Random Chat Thread [462]

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History / What made Poland into the country it is today? [62]


He and Vance are permanently angry. Fortunately nobody cares.


Medvedev is funny sometimes however he forgot one key thing. These aren't "proposals"; they are an ultimatum.

Off-Topic / Habemus Papam / The New Pope [91]


God forbid they'd get a shepherd, razor sharp mind or not.

What next? A fisherman?

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


He inherited the money; his family own an emerald mine. Thiel was the brains behind PayPal, not him. Tesla has gone down the pan. Contracts with Space X are being cancelled; he lost 25 billion this week alone.

And of course he's tried to interfere in the politics of countries that have absolutely nothing to do with him like Germany and Britain.

Plus, those fascist salutes are just cúntish behaviour

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


Within a few generations population levels would plummet. In the short term there would have to be food rationing.


Well... there are always pluses and minuses, for every reaction there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Off-Topic / Habemus Papam / The New Pope [91]

The eschaton.

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


That's a deflection or a misunderstanding. Economic imperialism is as you know different. It happens, and it's happening now. America thrives on it. The EU isn't a community of equal partners in that respect. The future is difficult and needs feeding carefully.


That is my feeling too. Him, Thiel and Cance are the danger.

I can't make out Sara Wagenecht. She reminds me of the 'trot' left in UK and Ireland. Sort of a horseshoe effect where far left and far right begin to touch.

Off-Topic / Habemus Papam / The New Pope [91]

@Tlum
That's very beautifully said.

We are stewards of this beautiful round planet orbiting our sun, part of one small arm of the Milky Way, one of billions of galaxies in a universe (or u oversee) far too vast for the human mind to comprehend. Even after our time on earth, the earth will go on, turning assuming the Anthropocene era doesn't destroy it through greed.


It's fine to struggle, fine to have crises of faith. Just asking as we don't ever lose sight of:

Off-Topic / Habemus Papam / The New Pope [91]

Interesting that he's the first Pope who (through the Cajun part of his family) has Black and Native American roots.

He seems a very interesting person, and as a Mathematician and polyglot, obviously has a razor sharp mind.

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


This from you? The discussion here moves sluggishly but effectively without your input.


There you go again. You are not in a position to make demands or set conditions.

The problems that Europe face have very little to do with immigration; it is simply a paper tiger that rules up the lowest common denominator.

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]

Why would anyone have to "make a case"?


What is that?

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


Tacitus does very much know what he's talking about when assessing the political landscape in his own country. And there's no reason he should agree to your silly demands about quotes. I disagree with his assessment of UK society and politics however when discussing internal German matters his views are sound and most important,y from someone there.


He's a vile character and a wannabe Bond Villain. The fascist salutes should give you a clue about his character.

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


There are much better parallels. Your friend was probably being polite. It's worth remembering where the Industrial Revolution started in the 1750s.


The problem with populism is that so much of it is about subverting overly restrictive legal frameworks and rigid and unspontaneous cultural world views that lack a safety valve for the personal gain of its backers.


Economically, you and I both know that it is.

However you are being rather upierdliwy, and this discussion isn't moving forward the genuine concerns about the reemergence of fascism in Germany. A cynic or a sceptic would suggest that attempts at defection are present. So, what do you think about the attempts at interference in elections by that Musk character?

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


Except of course you don't. Just opinions bordering on obsession about a culture you and almost nobody else understands.


Enough people already do, however economic imperialism will obviously do for now unless they continue use to deteriorate.


They really are chalk and cheese; there are several regions on the island which correspond closer to the Ruhr valley. As I say, never try to understand things that not outsider in history has succeeded in understanding.


We have that too. Those are largely just words from people who can do nothing, however the people with such banners do get prosecuted when it is feasible to do so. A healthy tradition of demonstrations is fine, as long as they're spontaneous rather than carefully planned and as long as society uses the full force of the law when laws are broken.


As I said earlier, fascists are like wolves in sheep's' clothing. They try to pass themselves off as reasonable, pretend their supporters have valid concerns or that there's some sort of existential risk to society (generally blaming migration or ethnic minorities) and when they get a sniff of power, they reveal their true face.

I'd worry about Hungary too; they're already meddling in Ukraine at Putler's behest and they're only a short drive or train ride into Germany with no real borders.

Off-Topic / Habemus Papam / The New Pope [91]


True, however so many drown due to lack of material resources in such societies; thousands go bankrupt over there every year due to hospital 'bills'.


Hopefully all good people think that, however people who hoard society's resources for themselves tend to be pernicious, greedy and amoral. And sometimes sadly effective in the short/medium term.

News / Presidential elections 2025 - the race has commenced!!! [665]


Normal enough. Stability and fairer societies always go together.


Your last bloke wasn't that nice, however if Woodrow Wilson had pn't been able to veto the British plan to install Kaiser Bill's moderate and very popular grandson as monarch and a rallying point for t( nation, history may well have turned out very differently.

Off-Topic / Habemus Papam / The New Pope [91]


Good luck with that one in a nakedly capitalistic society.


It's his first language of course and it was nice to see him start the Mass in English the other day.

News / Presidential elections 2025 - the race has commenced!!! [665]


Yes. Unhelpful to say the least. Of course it depends on the system, the relationship between Head of State and Head of Government which does of course differ from country to country, however the result is usually stasis.


Democracy takes many forms; there is no single model. Those countries, almost all among the most democratic, developed and stable countries in the world, who have a traditional Head of State, operate by consensus. The monarch's role is to advise, warn and admonish,. Also to make decisions, like a casting vote, if there is no consensus between politicians (usually if an election result is close or a Head of Government dies or is taken ill in office). They do this with the consent of the people, just as they have to abdicate when they lose that consent.

It works by trust and decency; in the vanishingly rare situation that is breached, there are of course mechanisms in place to mitigate it.

As you know, having a hereditary monarchy that has survived for over a thousand years is a sign that a system is working and has not collapsed through instability, dictatorship or revolution.

Off-Topic / Pop A Cork - Wine [396]


Yes, an excellent wine.

Do you know Hawke's Bay? They've been producing wine in at that vineyard in NZ for many years. It's superb.

Off-Topic / Habemus Papam / The New Pope [91]


Most aren't Catholic.

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


No, it of course refers to the famous speech by your country's leader.



That's what they do. Part of the fascist playbook is the wolf in sheep's clothing technique, pretending to be reasonable.


Oh dear, you're scraping the bottom of the barrel trawling Google for quotes from there. Good that Universal Credit works though. Hard to know what connection that has to do with leaving your imperialistic trading block though...

Back to the topic. A couple of interesting articles here:
German spy agency brands far-right AfD as 'extremist', opens way for closer surveillance
reuters.com/world/europe/german-spy-agency-ranks-far-right-afd-extremist-2025-05-02/

In 2017, ten AfD Bundestag members were found to have participated in a closed Facebook group named "the Patriots" in which, among other things, antisemitic, racist, pro-Nazi and conspiratorial posts were widespread. One meme posted therein, which showed the Holocaust victim Anne Frank's face edited on a pizza box labelled with the German equivalent of "fresh from the oven"
dw.com/en/afd-in-the-bundestag-hitler-hate-and-hooligans/g-71754221

An oven-ready political party...

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


There are no "premature elections", that concept does not traditionally exist there.. Nor is the number of PMs at all relevant; it all was one administration. And 4 PMs, May, Bojo, Truss and Sunak. Now we've voted a better party in and have a good one for the foreseeable.

You really are an upierdliwy obsessive, and I only now read the first line of your whiny posts. As you've been told, the U.K. is doing nicely.

But of course you're trying to deflect from the rise of neo-Nazis in your own country. Let's stick to that sordid topic.

Edit, I just saw two cities mentioned. Both major metropolises, in the case of Manchester, the southern suburbs are among the most affluent places in Europe. I was in Berlin last month. Grafitti everywhere, poverty level shops and junkies passed out in the street in Neukolln.

Perhaps if Germany didn't have such a twisted and imperialistic concept of nationality and actually spent sometime integrating new arrivals as new Germans, perhaps you'd not have so many neo-Nazis in parliament, determined to 'other' whole sections of German society as if they weren't part of the nation.

Off-Topic / Stock Market Talk and Trading - part 2 [496]


True, however we're still one of the world's larger manufacturing countries. Where I am at home there, there are mile upon mile of of factories all working hard. Big in food and pharmaceuticals. In my area clothing and a few other things.

Plus of course all the other stuff. People forget that the U.K. holds most of the patents connected with graphene, the new generation of Small Modular Reactors and a few other things. And as you say, services, especially education. And London is Europe's biggest tourist destination, with slightly more annual visitors than Paris.

Off-Topic / Habemus Papam / The New Pope [91]

Apparently our new Pope has a degree in Mathematics.

That means he doesn't just understand sin, he also understands cos, tangent and hypoteneuse...

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


He probably means well, however doesn't seem to have any problems with (and in fact seems obsessed with) the idea of a transnational superstate.

And I've said here before, if someone's foreign they should not try to understand Britain or how the British think and behave. They will fail.

Of course his last few very long posts are just trying to deflect from the sad topic of this thread.


I forgot to mention Belgium. There too last month. What struck me was that much of Brussels reminded me of the east part of Warsaw 25 years ago, only more run down. Plenty of fascists there too.

We sometimes forget that despite unification, some of the places where the neo-Nazi AfD get a lot of votes are not prosperous places to live.

News / Will PiS be happy if AfD wins elections in Germany? [1301]


Crikey. You really are obsessed with the EU, aren't you.

I'll not bother to actually read your post, only to say that everything's been fine since leaving and the political situation there is far better and more stable than other major countries tries in Europe.

Within the last month, I've been in your country, in France, in the U.K. and in Poland. The first two just feel so poor and run down compared to Britain and Poland. Less in the shops, nothing new opening and palpably poor infrastructure.

You also keep trying to deliberately distract from the topic of the thread because it embarrasses you. Just to remind readers, the topic is not the EU and not other European countries that are either menders of it or aren't.

The topic is re-emergence of fascism in Germany, due to the rise of the neo-Nazi AfD. A worry for those of us who live in Poland due to what happened last time fascists held office there.

Off-Topic / Habemus Papam / The New Pope [91]


And you are wrong by their defińition. God is bigger than any one set of religious beliefs; even the RCC acknowledge that.


Most of the OT is just oral tradition from an Iron Age society.


Quite. Some people see prayers for intercession as a sort of vending machine.

News / Man with axe attacks people at Warsaw University [17]


If his mental health is such that he did an appalling thing like that, then he's innocent due to his illness which he has no control over.

And of course civilised societies don't have the death penalty; Poland is not China.

About protecting the innocent (from the effects of serious mental illness in others), perhaps society would do well not to squeeze mentalhealth services in order to provide tax breaks for 'investors' and expensive statues of dead clergy.